Hello AI: Oracle axes thousands ✂️

Hey Superheroes,

A quick note before we dive in. Spotlight is landing in your inbox on Thursday this week ahead of the Good Friday and Easter break. Normal programming resumes next week.

It’s been one of those weeks where the news kept coming. Oil pulled back after Trump signalled the war with Iran could wind down within weeks, giving markets a reason to rally. The ASX 200 surged 2.24% on Wednesday, its best session in months, clawing back some of March’s  losses. In the meantime, Brent crude is hovering around US$101 a barrel, well off its US$119 spike, but nowhere near comfortable. And while investors are breathing a little easier, the bigger question remains. Can the rally hold, or is this just a breather?

Here’s what moved this week.

Oracle’s AI pivot is costing thousands of jobs 

Oracle is spending billions to build out AI infrastructure. And it’s cutting thousands of workers to help pay for it.

The company began notifying staff this week as part of a major restructuring. Reports suggest around 30,000 roles have already been affected, with cuts spanning senior engineers, architects, operations leaders and cloud infrastructure specialists.

💼 What’s happening 

Oracle employed about 162,000 people as of May 2025. 

The layoffs are among the largest in US tech this year.

The company has not formally disclosed the total number of cuts, but filings indicate restructuring costs could reach up to US$2.1 billion.

A senior manager at Oracle described it as a “significant reduction in force” across multiple divisions.

💰 Why it’s happening 

Oracle has been ramping up capital spending to compete with cloud giants like Amazon and Google in the race to build AI data centre capacity.

That push includes a deal worth more than US$300 billion with OpenAI and plans to raise US$50 billion in new debt and equity. But Oracle is relatively smaller than its cloud peers, and investors have been growing uneasy about the debt load and shrinking cash flow.

The company’s stock is down about 25% this year, more than any of the US tech megacaps.

Analysts at TD Cowen estimated that cutting 20,000 to 30,000 employees could generate US$8 to US$10 billion in additional free cash flow. That gives you a sense of the financial pressure management is under.

🤖 The bigger picture 

Oracle isn’t alone. More than 70 tech companies have cut roughly 40,000 jobs so far this year, according to Layoffs.fyi. In many cases, the pattern is the same. Cut headcount. Redirect spending toward AI.

Oracle’s leadership says the AI investment will pay off. Its remaining performance obligations, a measure of contracted but unrecognised revenue, sit at US$553 billion. That’s enormous. But for the thousands of employees who lost their roles this week, the payoff is someone else’s story.

Xero teams up with Anthropic, and Amodei heads to Canberra 

It was a big week for AI in Australia, and specifically for Anthropic, the company behind Claude.

Accounting platform Xero announced a multi-year partnership with Anthropic that will embed Claude’s AI directly into its software. The deal also works in the other direction. Xero’s financial data and tools will be accessible inside Claude.ai, giving small business owners the ability to ask questions about cash flow, overdue invoices and profit margins without leaving the platform.

🤝 What the deal means 

Xero’s AI assistant JAX (Just Ask Xero) will be powered by Claude’s reasoning engine, enabling it to analyse revenue, flag overdue invoices and suggest financial actions in real time. Xero’s engineering teams will also use Claude and Anthropic’s Cowork tool to accelerate product development.

This is significant because Xero was one of the hardest hit stocks on the ASX when Anthropic’s product update in February sparked fears of a so-called “SaaS-pocalypse.” Shares crashed 16% that day.

Now, rather than being disrupted by AI, Xero has partnered with its would-be disruptor. Some analysts see it as a template other software companies may follow.

🏛️ Amodei meets Albanese 

Separately, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei flew to Canberra this week and signed a memorandum of understanding with the Australian  government.

Under the deal, Anthropic will share data from its Economic Index, which tracks how AI tools like Claude are being used across different industries, to help the government understand AI adoption and its impact on jobs. The agreement also covers joint safety evaluations with Australia’s AI Safety Institute and research collaborations with universities including ANU and the Garvan Institute.

Anthropic also confirmed it is exploring data centre investments in Australia and plans to open a Sydney office later this year.

The deal mirrors similar arrangements Anthropic has signed in the US, UK and Japan, and comes as Australia works through its National AI Plan without specific AI legislation in place.

🚀 To the moon 

Meanwhile, off the planet entirely, NASA just launched its Artemis II mission, sending four astronauts toward the moon for the first time in more than 50 years.

The crew, aboard the Orion capsule on top of the massive Space Launch System rocket, launched from Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. If everything goes to plan, they will fly within roughly 6,600 kilometres of the lunar surface on April 6 before returning to Earth for a Pacific Ocean splashdown on day 10.

The mission includes several historic firsts. Christina Koch will be the first woman to fly near the moon. Victor Glover will make history as the first person of color to travel to the lunar vicinity . And Canadian Jeremy Hansen will be the first from his country to make the trip.

It’s a dress rehearsal for the eventual return of humans to the lunar surface, which NASA is targeting as early as 2028. The mission also carries geopolitical weight as the US races to reach the moon before China, which has set its own crewed lunar goal for before the end of the decade.

🔦 Some other things we’re shining the Spotlight on:

BACKED TO $1.2B: Taxpayer support for Arafura Rare Earths has now reached almost $1.2 billion after Export Finance Australia took a US$100 million equity stake and German development bank KFW added another €50 million. The funding backs the Nolans project in the Northern Territory, which is set to become Australia’s first ore-to-oxide rare earths facility. The project is part of broader efforts to reduce reliance on China’s dominance in critical minerals. Arafura’s biggest shareholder is Gina Rinehart at 15.7%. Shares are up 80% over the past year.

KOALA CLIMBS ON ASX DEBUT: Bed and furniture retailer Koala had a strong first day on the ASX, with shares jumping almost 12% to give it a market cap of around $340 million. Co-founded in Byron Bay a decade ago, Koala is forecasting full-year revenue of $332 million and EBITDA of $24.8 million, more than double last year. Notably, Australian cricketer Steve Smith’s early $100,000 investment for a 10% stake is now worth more than $13 million. It was one of the few IPOs to get away in a tough year for new listings.

GOLD HITS NEW HIGHS: Gold futures pushed above US$4,658 an ounce this week, driven by a weaker US dollar and shifting expectations around global interest rates. The precious metal has been on a strong run in 2026, with investors seeking safety amid ongoing geopolitical uncertainty. It’s a reminder that while oil has been grabbing headlines, gold has quietly been one of the best performing assets of the year.

Enjoy the long weekend, Superheroes. Don’t forget the AU & US Markets are closed on 3 April 2026 and the AU Market is closed again on 6 April 2026 for Easter.  Stay up to date with the markets by following us on Instagram @superheroau.